Chapter X. The Parable of the Three Measures is explained in Relation to Christ

It seems to me that those three measures of flour mentioned by the Evangelist as having been mixed and t What he means here the Saint explains in another passage, where he says, " The Majesty of the Word has been shod with the shoe of our humanity " (Calceo humanitatis nostrae calceata fuit Verbi Majestas). The latchet of course is taken to signify the bond of union between the two natures. The same mystical interpretation of the Baptist's words is found with . several others of the Fathers as, for instance, with SS. Gregory and Jerome on Mark i. 7, and with Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, 1. v. c. viii. Cf. A Lapide, Comment. Matth. i. 11. — (Translator.)

leavened to form one and the same loaf of bread (Matt. xiii. 33), may be understood not unreasonably as illustrating the union of the three substances in Christ. Oh, how well has Mary mixed and leavened these, since even when the Soul was separated from the Body neither was parted from the Word ! This union remained inviolate in the separation caused by death. For the connection existing between the three elements could not be broken by the division which " hath happened in part " (Rom. ii. 25). It did not matter whether two of these elements were united to or separated from each other : the hypostatic union continued equally in all three. Even after the death of the Man, the Word, the Soul, and the Body continued nevertheless to be one Person, one Christ, f It was in the Virgin's womb, as it seems to me, that this mingling and leavening of the three substances took place, and she was the woman who mingled and leavened them. And perhaps I should not be far wrong were I to say that her faith was the leaven she used. Truly blessed is she that believed, because those things have been accomplished that were spoken to her by the Lord (Luke i. 45). But they would not have been perfectly accomplished, unless, according to the word of the

| Although death dissolved the substantial union between the Soul and Body of Christ, each remained hypostatically united to the Divinity and continued to subsist by the Person of the Word. Consequently, in death as in life, the three Substances, Body, Soul, and Divinity, as subsisting by the same hypostasis, remained one Person, one Christ. Some eminent theologians, such as Peter Lombard (the Master of the Sentences) and Hugh of St. Victor, have held that Christ continued to be a man during the triduum when His Soul and Body were separated ; but St. Thomas (Sum. Theol , III. q. 1. a. 4) pronounces this opinion erroneous.- (Translator.)

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Lord, " the whole was leavened " (Matt. xiii. 33), and leavened for all time, so as to preserve for us, as well in death as in life, without division or diminution, without any divorce between the Human Nature in Him and the Divine, " the one Mediator of God and men, the Man Christ Jesus."

Thou mayest notice in this most excellent mystery a threefold distinction of degree, very wonderful and beautiful, which corresponds to the three measures of the Gospel parable. For we find in it something that is new, something that is old, something also that is eternal. The something new is the Soul Which, as we know, was created out of nothing at the moment of Its infusion into the Body. The something old is the Flesh Which, as thou art aware, was derived from the flesh of Adam, the first of men. The something eternal is the Word Whom, as indubitable faith teaches us, the Father hath begotten from eternity co-eternal with Himself. And in this same mystery, if thou considerest it carefully, thou shalt discover three manifestations of divine power. For it shall reveal to thee something that has been made from nothing, and something that has been made new from old, and something that from reprobate and dead has been made eternal and blissful. But it may be asked what has this to do with our salvation ? " Much in every way " (Rom. hi. 2). For the manifestations I speak of belong to ourselves. In the first place, it is through the mystery of the Incarnation that, after being reduced to nothingness by sin, we have been in a manner created anew, so " that we might be some beginning of His creature " (James i. 18). In the second place, it is by its means that we have been

" delivered from the old servitude of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God " (Rom. viii. 21) and now " walk in newness of spirit " (Rom. vi. 4 ; vii. 6). We owe to it, thirdly, that we have been called " from the power of darkness " (Col. i. 13) into the kingdom of immortal glory, and made to sit there even now in Jesus Christ (Ephes. ii. 16). Let us keep far away from those who endeavour to alienate from us the Flesh of Christ, impiously asserting that It was created new in the womb of the Virgin, and not assumed from the Virgin's flesh. Long before this doctrine, rather say this blasphemy, had been enunciated by the wicked, it was beautifully rebutted by the prophetic Spirit in the words, " There shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root " (Is. xi. 1). The Prophet might have said, 11 and a flower shall rise up out of the rod," but he preferred the other expression, " a flower shall rise up out of his root," because he wished to make it plain that the flower and the rod derived their origin from the same source. Consequently, the Flesh of Christ and that of Mary had the one origin, and That was not newly created in the Virgin Which sprang from the same root as herself.